2

had been partly reclaimed by the Romans, and had been for a time a fertile country.1 But in the time of the Domesday Book it was once again a mere marsh, owing to incursions of the sea, which the English at that time had not the ability to prevent. Although even in 1436, and subsequently, partial attempts had been made to reclaim this vast area, the first effectual effort was begun only in 1634, by the Earl of Bedford, who received 95,000 acres of the reclaimed land as a reward for his undertaking. The contract was fulfilled under the superintendence of the engineer Vermuyden, a Dutchman, in 1649, and a corporation was formed to manage the Bedford level," as it was now called, in 1688. The reclaiming of so much land naturally increased the prosperity of the counties in which it stood, and their agriculture flourished considerably in consequence, Bedfordshire for instance being now the most exclusively agricultural county in the kingdom. Similar operations were effected in Hatfield Chase.3

§ 162. Rise of Price of Corn and of Rent.

The price of corn, meanwhile, was now steadily rising. From 1401 to 1540-i.e., before the rise in prices and the debasements of the coinage-the average price had been a farthing under six shillings per quarter; after prices had recovered from their inflation, and settled down to a general average once more, taking the price from 1603 to 1702, corn was forty-one shillings per quarter.5 The average produce had apparently declined, or, at any rate, had not increased since the fifteenth and before the improvements of the seventeenth century. In the former period it was about twelve bushels per acre," and in

1 See article on Bedford Level in Chambers' Encyclopædia (ed. 1888), and Denton, Fifteenth Century, pp. 140-141; also Smiles, Lives of the Engineers, Vol. I., p. 10.

2 See more fully Gardiner, History of England, ch. lxxxiv., Vol. VIII., p. 295. As the rent was, after the draining, about 30s. an acre, the earl's reward was very substantial.

3 lb., Vol. VIII. p. 292. This was in 1626, and Vermuyden was knighted for his efforts (1629); cf. Smiles, Lives of the Engineers, Vol. I., for Life and Works of Vermuyden.

5 Ib., v. 276.

4

Rogers, Hist. Agric., iv. 292.

5

the fourteenth century eleven bushels; but Gregory King, writing in the seventeenth century, only gives ten or eleven bushels as the average of his time.2 His estimate, however, is doubted. At the same time, rent had risen from the sixpence per acre of the fifteenth century to four shillings, according to Professor Rogers, or even 5s. 6d., according to King," who says the gains of the farmer of his time were very small, and that rents were more than doubled between 1600 and 1699. We will reserve the topic of the rise of rent, however, for a separate section, and keep to the agricultural developments of the period.

§ 163. Special Features of the Eighteenth Century.
Popularity of Agriculture.

As the use of winter roots had been the special feature of the seventeenth century, so the feature of the eighteenth was the extension of artificial pasture and the increased use of clover, sainfoin, and rye-grass; 7 not, of course, that these had been hitherto unknown, but now their seeds were regularly bought and used by any farmer who knew his business. At first, like all other processes of agriculture, the development was very slow and gradual, but it went on steadily nevertheless. A great stimulus to progress was given by the fact that the English gentlemen of the eighteenth century developed quite a passion for agriculture as a hobby, and it became a fashionable pursuit for all people of any means, citizens and professional men joining in it as a kind of bye-industry, in addition to the farmers and landowners, who made it their business. Arthur Young, the great agricultural writer of this century, declares that "the farming tribe is now made up of all classes, from a duke to an apprentice." It should also be added that in the eighteenth

Rogers, Six Centuries, pp. 476 and 442.

2 In Davenant's Works, ii. 217.

3 Rogers, Hist. Agric., v. 783.

4 Taylor, the author of the Common Good (1652), gives (p. 15) 3s. 4d. per acre as a typical rent in his time.

Hist. Agric., v. 92.

Quoted in Rogers, Hist. Agric., v. 92, who gives 4s. 1d. as the average rental of the Belvoir estate.

7 Rogers, Six Centuries, p. 468.

8 Ib., p. 470.

century more capital was being applied to the pursuit of agriculture. The wealth gained by the commercial progress of the day was largely put into the land, and the great revolution that now took place in English agriculture was carried on under the influence of men of wealth.1 But two important mistakes were made in the eighteenth century, and they have not ceased to exist in the nineteenth, increasing very largely the distress under which English agriculture has for some time (1895) been labouring. They are the mistakes of occupying too much land with insufficient capital, and of not keeping regular and detailed accounts.2 Improvements also were not universal, but were often confined, at least at first, to scattered parts of the country.3 Progress was to begin with (say from 1700 to 1760) * rather slow, but afterwards became very rapid, and wealthy landowners made great efforts to improve their estates, succeeding also thereby in raising their rents and increasing their profits.5 They thus became in a way the pioneers of agricultural progress, the principal result of their efforts being seen in the increased number and quality of the stock now kept on farms.

§ 164. Improvements of Cattle, and in the Productiveness of Land. Statistics.

The extended cultivation of winter roots, clover, and other grasses naturally made it far easier for the farmer to feed his animals in the winter; and the improvement in stock followed closely upon the improvement in fodder." The abundance of stock, too, had again a beneficial result

1 Cunningham, Growth of Industry, ii. 362.

2 Arthur Young, quoted in Rogers, Six Centuries, p. 471. 3 Toynbee, Industrial Revolution, p. 41.

4 Ib., p. 45.

5 Cunningham, Growth of Industry, ii. 363, 364, following Young, praises these wealthy landowners for their efforts, and expresses surprise that later writers have attacked such men for raising rents and for other reasons. No doubt the landowners are entitled to every praise for their spirited efforts, but to call a man (as Young practically does) the greatest of patriots for following the obvious course of enlightened self-interest is little less than absurd. A landlord who makes a profit out of his land by improvements in husbandry deserves such a title as little, or as much, as a manufacturer who derives a handsome profit from a new machine. "Rogers, Six Centuries, p. 475.

in the production of increased quantities of manure, and the utilisation of fertilisers was more scientifically developed. The useful, though costly, process of marling was again revived, and was advocated by Arthur Young; soils were also treated with clay, chalk, or lime.1 So great was the improvement thus made, that the productiveness of land in the eighteenth century rose to four times that of the thirteenth century, when five bushels or eight bushels of corn per acre was the average.2 Stock, also, was similarly improved; an eighteenth century fatted ox often weighed over 800 lbs.,3 while hitherto, from the fourteenth to the end of the seventeenth century, the weight had not been usually much above 400 lbs. The weight of the fleece of sheep had also increased quite four times. Population being even then small, a considerable quantity of corn was exported, the British farmer being also protected from foreign competition by the corn laws (made in Charles II.'s reign), forbidding importation of corn, except when it rose to famine prices. Young estimated the cultivated acreage of the country at 32,000,000 acres, arable and pasture being in equal proportions, whereas King had put it at only 22,000,000 in the seventeenth century; its value (at thirty-three and one-half years' purchase) was, says Young, £536,000,000. The value of stock he places at nearly £110,000,000, and estimates the wheat and rye crop at over 9,000,000 quarters per annum, barley at 11,500,000 quarters, and oats at 10,250,000 quarters. The rent of land had risen in Young's time to nearly ten shillings an acre.8

Rogers, Six Centuries, p. 476.

6

2 Ib., 477; cf. also Young, who gives 25 bushels an acre (in 1770), while in France it was only 18 bushels. Travels in France, i. 354.

3 Cf. Eden, State of the Poor, i. 334; Toynbee, Industrial Revolution, 44, but Rogers, Six Centuries, p. 477, gives 1200 lbs. 4 Ib., p. 477.

See the 22 Charles II., c. 13, by which a duty of 16s. a qr. was placed on wheat when at or below 53s. 4d., and a duty of 8s. when it was between 53s. 4d. and 80s. a qr. Other kinds of grain were similarly treated. We have seen that the average price of wheat at this time was 41s. a qr. ; hence the effect of this law may be easily perceived.

Northern Tour, iv. 340-341, but cf. Eastern Tour, iv. 455.

7 Observations upon the State and Condition of England, 1696; printed in Chalmers' Estimate, p. 52.

8 Cf. Rogers, Six Centuries, p. 477; but also cf. Hist. Agric., v. 29.

§ 165. Survivals of Primitive Culture.

2

Common Fields.

With all these improvements, however, rural England, even as late as the middle of the eighteenth century, retained in its husbandry many traces of a more primitive state of things. Again and again the permanence of ancient institutions and methods surprises us, here as elsewhere, just as Arthur Young was surprised in his tours through his own country. Thus at Boynton (Yorks) Young found remains of extensive culture; in other cases the old two-field or three-field system was carried on; as, for instance, near Ecclesfield in Hallamshire, and at Beverley in Yorkshire. Throughout considerable districts, in fact, the agrarian system of the middle ages still remained in force ;3 and naturally, compared with the newer methods of agriculture, it yielded but poor results. "Never," says Arthur Young, "were more miserable crops seen than the spring ones in the common fields; absolutely beneath contempt." 4 The causes of this backward state of things were many, but all naturally arose from the difficulties inherent in the common field system when some of those who used it had surpassed their co-workers in agricultural progress. For one thing the same course of crops was nearly always necessary, and no proper rotation was feasible, the only possible alteration being to vary the proportions of different white-straw crops."

A man of enterprise was therefore greatly hindered; for if he worked with his neighbours in these open fields he was compelled to follow a traditional but unprogressive course of husbandry against his better judgment. Then, again, much time was lost by labourers and cattle travelling to many dispersed pieces of land from one end of the parish to another." There were continuous quarrels among neighbours about rights of pasture in the meadows, 1 Northern Tour, ii. 7. 2 Ib., ii. 1, cf. also i. 126.

Toynbee, Industrial Revolution, p. 39.

Southern Tour, p. 384 (ed. 1772).

Cf. Toynbee, Indust. Revolution, p. 40, and Cunningham, Growth of Industry, ii. p. 370.

"Toynbee, Indust. Revolution, p. 40.

"Young, View of the Agriculture of Oxfordshire, p. 100.

S